Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Nonjatta 2nd Release Lottery

The results of the lottery for our 2nd ‘Ghost’ release are in. We were overwhelmed by the sheer number of applications and wish to thank everyone who participated. The lucky winners – and we’re glad that, by pure luck, they come from all corners of the world – will be contacted on Friday, so keep an eye on your inbox (and your spam folder!). As per the rules outlined in our original post and on the Malt City page, those who have won have one week to respond and confirm that they wish to proceed and purchase the bottle.

We are working on other releases, from other distilleries, with a better outturn so that we can make more of you happy, so stay tuned. In the meantime, we want to thank all of you again for the kind words and support. It means a lot to us.

That's a lot of people... Very little chance to be selected unfortunately (keeping fingers crossed though) but anyway, as agreed by a lot of Nonjatta fans, great initiative this lottery! I bought concert ticket this way in the past. At least it's fair indeed.

Many of you guys already mantioned about that's a fair lottery and I do agree 100%! Now I'd like to rise the question to see what you think will those lucky people will do with the bottles, how many of those do you think will try it? how many will sell it generating an incredible profit from what I believe THE smallest limited edition Karuizawa? Kampai!

Those are valid questions but we can't really control what people do with their bottle. We tried to make it as fair as possible in terms of distribution of the bottles. Re-distribution (selling on auctions, etc) is something out of our control...

Part of it was bottled two years ago, for sale at the distillery shop -when it was a 16yo. Those bottles were never for sale anywhere else in the country, only at the distillery shop (I know cause I used to go there all the time), and because they were very cheap and in slightly smaller bottles (480 / 500ml) they were very popular with tourists who were in Karuizawa for the various other attractions the area has to offer (not specifically the distillery) to take back home as souvenirs for friends, or for themselves. So your chances of finding a bottle of that are very, very slim... (and I know because it's one of the few Rouge Cask distillery only bottlings missing from my personal collection).

So sadly, it seems Friday (Japan time) has come and gone with no email in the inbox; o for 2 on Nonjatta bottles thus far. I hope those 22 bottles found good homes and I'm already looking forward to the 3rd Nonjatta release to try my luck once more.

I'm afraid the answer is simple: nowhere. Basically, in Japan rare bottles don't even reach shops... Example: The Game 5 (Hanyu, Ichiro's Malt 2000 / 2013) was online here in Japan for less than 5 minutes before being sold out. Such is the situation at present. So, whereas 10 years ago there were loads of stores with interesting bottlings, nowadays you have a better chance of finding rare Japanese whiskies abroad (like I did, when I was in Belgium this summer and found stuff I would never have been able to buy here in Japan - long gone) than in Japan. Sad but that's the way things stand.

Whisky Bars Kyoto

A few Links

Introduction

This site is probably the most comprehensive source on the Japanese whisky scene in English. It is also independent. No one who writes for Nonjatta is employed or paid by Japanese distillers and/or retailers.